I’ve been in love with TikTok since the beginning of 2020. At first, I started just watching funny videos and dance trends, and then I slowly came to see that there were professionals out there sharing information or growing their businesses. I started watching these videos and thought it might be fun to take a stab at expanding my business on TikTok since I was already on the app. Well after a few weeks of getting minimal views about respectful parenting, I had a video go viral. I reached a million views within a week of posting it and I wasn’t at all prepared for the trolls and keyboard warriors to come for me. Here are four life lessons I’ve learned after going viral multiple times on TikTok:
You can’t be authentic and have everyone like you.
Thank goodness for the block and delete feature. I wish this feature existed for other people I’ve encountered in real life. But in all seriousness, we aren’t designed to agree with everyone or like everyone and that is ok. We are drawn to those that take a stance or show who they truly are. If everyone likes you, you probably aren’t being true to yourself. We all need to get a little more comfortable with people not liking us.
You don’t owe anyone a response.
In the beginning, I thought I had to reply to every comment or defend myself against people who cut me down. I thought I had to continually justify myself in 150 characters or less. And then I realized that I didn’t owe anyone a reply and if it drained my energy, I probably shouldn’t do it. I’ve started to realize that this applies in the real world as well. If someone disagrees with you, you don’t owe them your energy trying to defend yourself.
For every troll, there is a fan.
When I had my first viral video, I clung to every negative comment. I’d get a pit in my stomach as the imposter syndrome crept up. I was happy that I had likes, positive comments, and more followers but the negativity impacted me more than I could’ve imagined. I realized that I was magnifying the bad and I needed to focus on the community I was building. I’ve found that we do these things in life, we need to focus more on the words of people that love us the most.
People want to feel seen and connected
Most of the time, the videos that do the best are the ones that share a common experience amongst mothers or the scary side of motherhood that no one talks about. People want to know they aren’t alone and that others have had the same experience. This again is vulnerability and connection of a shared experience. It seems that people feel more comfortable being vulnerable online but struggle in real life. I’ve noticed that this can be true for me as well and it’s something I’m striving more for both online and offline.
